Infamous St Ives bus trap immortalised in watercolour painting by …

A Cambridgeshire artist has brushed some joy onto St Ives' bus trap controversy by turning the scene of a stuck car into a painting. Anna Anderson asked a local group on social media to recommend what she should paint next as part of her series of watercolour paintings featuring towns and villages across the county – and the often debated ditch kept coming up.^[1]

Anna said: "Although I suspect it was a joke, the bus trap was a reoccurring theme. Not being one to disappoint, I painted a small watercolour sketch."

The bus trap comprises two pits in the road at the junction between Station Road and Harrison Way, in St Ives^[2]. Designed to stop people from driving onto the busway, it has left some people claiming to be 'shaken and traumatised'^[3] from getting stuck and others questioning whether someone who can't see the warning signs or holes in the road should be driving at all.

Anna added: "The car in question is fictional and I can confirm that no cars were harmed in the making of this painting. Separate to my paintings of more idyllic local scenes, all the money from the car trap painting will be donated to SERV Suffolk^[6] and Cambridgeshire^[7]."

SERV Suffolk and Cambridgeshire transports urgently-needed blood, blood products, patient samples, donated breastmilk, medicine and medical equipment. This way, it supports hospitals, the Air Ambulance, hospices and patients. By supporting this charity, Anna said she would like to 'turn this topic into a positive'.

Artist Anna has also painted picturesque scenes of Cambridgeshire towns and villages and depictions of aircraft in flight. Her work can be viewed and bought from her website here^[8].

References

1. ^{^} St Ives' bus trap controversy (www.cambridge-news.co.uk)
2. ^{^} St Ives (www.cambridge-news.co.uk)
3. ^{^} claiming to be 'shaken and traumatised' (www.cambridge-news.co.uk)
4. ^{^} "I visited St Ives for the first time and this is what I discovered" (www.cambridge-news.co.uk)
5. ^{^} New 'home from home' café 'catering to all tastes' to open in St Ives this month (www.cambridge-news.co.uk)
6. ^{^} Suffolk (www.cambridge-news.co.uk)
7. ^{^} Cambridgeshire (www.cambridge-news.co.uk)
8. ^{^} from her website here (www.annaandersonart.com)